


id make a deal with god

by dietmobu



Category: Banana Fish (Anime & Manga)
Genre: Angst, Character Death, M/M, Okumura Eiji Needs a Hug, but i was literally too sad, eiji asking the same questions i am, i meant to write bittersweet, sorry - Freeform, this is a projection
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-24
Updated: 2020-11-24
Packaged: 2021-03-09 19:42:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 820
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27701542
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dietmobu/pseuds/dietmobu
Summary: Ibe-san held him. And kept holding him. Eiji wasn’t sure if he could say it outloud, but it felt like everything around him was trying to keep him from falling into a million pieces. As if when Ibe-san let go, as if when his breath was released and his ribs stopped feeling taut like guitar strings, he would crumble into a thousand shards.-Eiji grieves.
Relationships: Ash Lynx/Okumura Eiji, Ibe Shunichi & Okumura Eiji
Comments: 4
Kudos: 38





	id make a deal with god

Maybe Eiji knew. Maybe he knew, from the way Ibe-san held himself, the silence of the room, the way the world seemed a bit duller since he left America. Maybe he knew, and he wasn’t sure if he should stop Ibe-san from saying it outloud, he didn’t know what to do at all. Maybe he knew, and maybe he needed to hear it, or maybe some other force was stopping him from saving himself from finalization.

“Eiji-chan…” he started, always so gentle when addressing him. The bags under his eyes grew a shade darker ever since they traveled, the lines in his kind face more engraved. Eiji wondered if he had that same look.

“I think I know. I think- I think…I…” Eiji found his voice breaking, his lungs squeezing so tight as if to hug his heart back together, his eyes filling with salty tears before he could even try to stop them.

In his heart he just knew. He just knew.

Ibe-san held him. And kept holding him. Eiji wasn’t sure if he could say it outloud, but it felt like everything around him was trying to keep him from falling into a million pieces. As if when Ibe-san let go, as if when his breath was released and his ribs stopped feeling taut like guitar strings, he would crumble into a thousand shards.

-

_ Why?  _

Eiji moved his hand under the hot water of the bath.

_ Why? _

He closed his eyes, his breath hot with steam.

_ Why would he decide to die? _

_ Why then? Why there?  _

His skin felt scalding hot.

_ After everything, after everything we went through. After everything he went through. Why then? _

Footsteps padded tentatively from the hallway. His sister.

_ Why would you leave me, Ash? _

-

“What did he look like?”

Eiji froze midreach, the basket of raspberries in his curious sister’s lap. She looked up at him then, and perhaps the emotion painted over her face was determination. Eiji didn’t want to guess the expression he wore. He was finding it more difficult these days to read emotions.

“ _ Him _ . What did he look like?” she asked again.

“Beautiful,” he whispered, “he was beautiful.”

“Beautiful? A man who’s beautiful?”

The wind rustled through his hair, the sun glaring behind him as he stared at the dancing grass. It seemed like forever since he last felt real, like he had been in one long dream. Like he was on the edge of falling, falling and falling.

“Beautiful, yeah. He had blond hair, almost as long as mine now, but straight and silky. It framed his face. He had green eyes, they were… I don’t know. Endless, maybe.”

“Endless?”

“He was taller than me, and strong. His cheeks were sharp, like a woman’s. He blushed when he laughed. He laughed like gold.”

“Eiji, your descriptions are like a poet. I just wanted to know what man you see in your nightmares.”

Eiji never thought he was much of a poet.

-

Being alone these days felt like nothing. Being with others felt like nothing. He supposed he was nothing. He wasn’t sad, or grieving, or angry. He went through as many why’s as he could. He stared at as many stars, begging one of them to shoot. He stared at the cats on the streets, and the water in his glass, and the pen he used to write his last letter.

He’d done every emotion.

Now he was just nothing. He wondered if it was okay to be nothing, if anyone else felt nothing too. He knew that nothing wasn’t him, he wondered if he was ever going to be himself again. He wondered if he even ever was.

Did Ash feel like the leopard?

When he walked, blood dripping from his stomach like crimson honey, did he feel like the leopard? Did he know he would leave Eiji with all the same questions? Did he dream of Eiji, did he try to turn back, was he trying to keep going? Did he, in his last moments, become the leopard?

Eiji cried over these questions once. Now he felt nothing. He wondered if Ash meant this feeling when he said he felt nothing.

-

Ibe-san stared at him. It was the same look he gave him when he couldn’t pole vault.

“What do you think you’ll do? Go to college?” he asked, always so gentle with his words. Eiji didn’t respond, staring out the car window. He didn’t really know where they were going.

“Eiji-chan-” he started, but Eiji cut him off.

“I’ve already lived my life, haven’t I?”

Ibe-san didn’t reply for a while. Eiji hoped he wouldn’t bring the implications of his statement up. Wishful thinking- when did he remember to have wishful thinking?

“Ash didn’t want this to happen.”

The silence stretched long. The silence grabbed Eiji by the throat. Wrapped it’s fingers around. He spoke to breathe again.

“Don’t speak for a dead man.”

**Author's Note:**

> lot on my mind. anyway listen to running up that hill by kate bush, its eiji and ash core.


End file.
